Tehelka Magazine, Vol 6, Issue 2, Dated Jan 17, 2009
We, The Nation(s) Of India
India breathes through her multiplicity, not her fragmenting voices
THERE IS a buzz about
India becoming a superpower. But, are superpowers confused about national
identity or inviting others to solve their civilisation’s “backwardness”?
Does a superpower allow foreign nexuses to co-opt its citizens as agents?
India graciously hosts foreign nexuses that treat it as a collection of
disparate parts. Is super - powerdom delusionary?
The Mumbai massacre painfully exposes flaws in our
national character, the central one being the absence of a
definitive, purpose-filled identity. Who is that “we” whose
interests are represented, internally and internationally?
How should Indianness be defined? Where is the Indianness
that transcends narrow identities and vested interests, one
that is worth sacrificing for? Is it in the popular culture of
Bollywood and cricket? Or is it deeper? The national identity
project is at once urgent and compelling.
The need for national
In their pursuit of personal
goals, Indians are intensely
competitive. But we lack consensus
on a shared national
essence and hence there is no deep psychological bond
between citizen and nation. National identity is to a nation’s
well-being what the immune system is to the body’s health.
The over-stressed body succumbs to external and internal
threats, and eventually death, as its immunity weakens. Similarly,
a nation stressed by a vacuum of identity, or multiple
conflicting identities, or outright confusion, can break up.
Just as the body’s immune system needs constant rejuvenation,
so too a nation needs a positive collective psyche for
its political cohesion.
Major nations deliberately pursue nation building
through such devices as shared myths, history, heroes,
religion, ideology, language and symbolism. Despite
internal dissent, Americans have deep pride of heritage,
and have constructed awe-inspiring monuments to their
founding fathers and heroic wars. Where are Delhi’s monuments
honouring the wars of 1857 or 1971, Shivaji,
the Vijayanagar Empire, Ashoka, or the peaceful spread
of Indian civilisation across Asia for a millennium?
Where are the museums that showcase India’s special place
in the world?
Forces that fragment
Voices of fragmentation drive India’s internal politics —
from Raj Thackeray to M Karunanidhi to Mamata Banerjee
to the Quota Raj to the agents of foreign proselytising.
While social injustice, in India and elsewhere, demands
effective cures, proper treatments do not follow faulty diagnoses.
Since colonial times, influential scholars have propagated
that there is no such thing as Indian civilisation. India
was “civilised” by successive waves of invaders. The quest for
Indianness is futile since India was never a nation. The noted
historian Romila Thapar concludes that India’s pluralism has
no essence. Like a doughnut, the center is void; only the
peripheries have identity.
Such thinking infects Indian elite. Supreme Court Justice
Markandey Katju, citing western historians, asserts that the
Munda tribes are the only true natives and that 95 percent
of Indians are immigrants; that all so-called Aryan and
Dravidian classical languages are foreign, ruling out anything
as pan-Indian in our antiquity;
and that worthwhile Indian
civilisation begins with Akbar,
“the greatest ruler the world
has ever seen.”
This accelerating crescendo,
portraying India as an inherently artificial, oppressive nation,
is directed by western academics advocating western intervention
to bring human rights. It is supported by private
foundations, churches and the US government and promotes
fragmentation by bolstering regional identities, “backward”
castes, and religious minorities. Sadly, our own
people, such as many activists and the westernised upper
class, have internalised India's “oppression of minorities.”
The human catastrophe that would envelope diverse groups
— especially the weakest — in the aftermath of India’s break
up is blithely ignored.
Beyond tolerance and assimilation
Critics worry that national identity promotes fascism. But
while many civilisations have used identity for conquest, my
vision of Indianness is driven by mutual respect. We respect
the other who is different provided the other reciprocates with
respect towards us, in rhetoric and in action. The religious “tolerance”
of Judaism, Islam and Christianity is a patronising
accommodation; it puts up with others’ differences without
respecting their right to be different. In contradistinction, Indian civilisation embraces differences reciprocally.
Movements that eradicate differences span the ideological
spectrum. Some religions claim mandates from God to
convert the religiously different. Although the European
Enlightenment project dispensed with God, it enabled erasing
ethnic diversity through genocide of Native Americans
and slavery of African-Americans. Asians were luckier,
because they could become “less different” via colonisation.
Today, many Indians erase their distinctiveness by glamorising
white identity as the gold standard. Skin lighteners
are literal whiteners. Media and pop culture incorporate
white aesthetics, body language and attire for social status,
careers and marriage. The venerable “namaste” is becoming
a marker of the older generations and the servants. Pop
Hindu gurus peddle the “everything is the same” mumbojumbo,
ignoring even the distinctions between the dharmic
and the un-dharmic. Intellectuals adopt white categories of
discourse as “universal”.
Difference eradicating ideologies are hegemonic. Either
you (i) assimilate, (ii) oppose and suffer, or (iii) get contained
But Indian philosophy is built on celebrating diversity —
in trees, flowers, matter, human bodies, minds, languages
and cultures, spiritualities and traditions — and does not see
it as a problem to be dealt with.
All social groups manifest an affinity for in-group relations
but in the ideal Indian ethos, in-group affinity is without
external aggression. Before colonial social engineering,
traditional Indian castes were fluid, informal containers of
identities, interwoven with one another, and not frozen
hierarchically. This applied to Muslims, Christians and Hindus.
Each caste had its distinct norms and was respected by
others. My India is a web of thousands of castes encapsulating
diverse genes and memes. This ideal is the exact opposite
of fascist ethnocentrism.
Diversity yes, fragmentation no
The socially mobile castes that had preserved India's diversity
were frozen into castes to serve the British divide-andrule.
Independent India adopted caste identities to allocate
quotas instead of safeguarding individual rights. When the
Congress party failed to integrate a vast mishmash of subidentities,
regional vote-banking entrepreneurs captured
India’s political fragments. Now, national interests are casually
disregarded for fear of offending these fragments.
has opened the floodgates for minority leaders to tie-up with western
churches and NGOs, Saudis, Chinese and just about anyone wanting to carve
out a slice of the Indian elephant. Such minorities include the Nagas,
now serving as a foreign subsidiary of the Texas Southern Baptist Church;
Tamils who first got Dravidianised and are now being Christianised through
identity engineering; Maoists in over 30 percent of India's districts;
and Saudifunded Pan-Islamists expanding across India. These fragmented
identities weaken Indianness due to their loyalty to foreign alliances.
The leaders depend on foreign headquarters for ideological and financial
Such groups are no longer minorities, but are agents of
dominant world majorities. They are franchisees of the global
nexuses they serve. They are adversaries of the Indian identity
formation. Do they truly help India’s under classes? These
global nexuses have a disappointing track record of solving
problems in countries where they have operated for generations,
including Latin America, Philippines and Africa where
most natives have become
converted. The imported religion
has failed to bring human
rights and has often exacerbated
problems. Yet, Indian
middlemen have mastered the
art of begging foreign patronage
in exchange for selling the
souls of fellow Indians.
Towards an Indian
Hindutva is a modern political
response lacking the elasticity
to be the pan-Indian
identity. Other popular ideas
are equally shallow, such as
the Indianness defined by Bollywood
and cricket. Ideals like
“secular democracy” and “development” do not a distinct
national identity make. It is fashionable to blend pop culture
with European ideologies and pass it off as Indianness. Such
blends cannot bind a complex India together against fissiparous
casteism and regionalism coming in the orbits of
Islamist jihad and evangelical Christianity.
Indianness must override fragmented identities, no matter
how large the vote bank or how powerful the foreign sponsor.
Gandhi articulated a grand narrative for India. Tagore and
Aurobindo saw continuity in Indian civilisation. Nehru had a
national vision, which Indira Gandhi modified and defended
fiercely. The Ashokan, Chola, and Maratha empires had welldefined
narratives, each with an idea of India.
Debating Indianness fearlessly and fairly
A robust Indianness must become the context in which serious
issues get debated. Everyone should be able to participate
— be it Advani or Sonia, the Imam of Jama Masjid or Hindu
gurus, Thackeray or the underworld — in a free and fair debate
on Indianness, and no one should be exempt from criticism.
But the Indian intellectual mafia, which built careers by
importing and franchising foreign doctrines, suppresses debate outside its framework, and brands honest attempts at
opposing them as fascism. I offer a few examples.
A few years before 9/11, the Princeton-based Infinity
Foundation proposed to a prestigious Delhi-based centre to
research the Taliban and their impact on India. The centre’s
intellectuals pronounced the hypothesis an unrealistic
conspiracy theory and unworthy of study. Even after 9/11,
the American Academy of Religion refused to study the
Taliban as a religious phenomenon while persisting with
Hindu caste, cows, dowry, mothers-in-law, social oppression,
violence and sundry intellectual staples.
Some analysts hyphenate Islamist terror with Kashmir,
imputing that terrorism is a
legitimate dispute resolution
technique. “The plight of
Muslims” is a rationalisation;
and Martha Nussbaum, a
University of Chicago professor,
blames “Hindu fascism” as
the leading cause of terrorism
and justifies the Mumbai
massacre by hyphenating it
with Hindu “pogroms,” Hindu
“ethnic cleansing against
Muslims,” and the Hindu
project to “Kill Christians and
destroy their institutions.” Her
insensitivity to the victims, just
two days after 26/11, was given
a free pass by the LA Times.
Double standards are evident
when cartoons lampooning Islam are condemned, whereas
serious attacks against Hindu deities, symbols and texts are
defended in the name of intellectual freedom.
Be positive and “live happily ever after”
The Bollywood grand finale, where the couple lives happily
ever after, is de rigueur. Friends insist that my analysis must
end with something positive by way of solving the problems
I uncover. Hard evidence of dangerous cleavages in India,
spinning out of control, is too “negative.” The need to work
backwards from a happy ending and only admit evidence
that fits such endings is an Indian psychological disorder.
But we don’t expect doctors to reject negative diagnoses,
analysts to ignore market crashes, or teachers to praise our
unruly children. What if there is no “good” alternative?
It is disturbing that strategic options against Pakistan
must subserve the sensitivities of Indian Muslims. This gratuitously
assumes that Indian Muslims are less Indian than
Muslim. Some fear that strong Indian action will precipitate
increased jihad, or even nuclear war. Such fears recapitulate
the early campaigns to appease Hitler. Once a violent cancer
spreads outside the tumour’s skin, it demands a direct attack. Vitamins, singing, and lamp-lighting are pointless.
In sports or warfare, medicine or marketing, you cannot win
by only using defence. The offensive option that cannot be
exercised is merely a showpiece. If national interests are
dominated by minority sentiments, our enemies will exploit
our weakness. A paralysed India emboldens predators.
Games nations play
After Indians return to psychological normalcy, apathy will
be confused as resilience. When each episode is seen in
isolation there is short-term thinking, a tolerance of terrorism,
and an acceptance that mere survival is adequate.
Strategic planning requires connecting the trends clearly.
Indians must understand the reality of multiple geopolitical
board games. Moves on one gameboard trigger consequences
on others, making the tradeoffs complex. The South
Asia gameboard involves USA-India-Pakistan as well as
China-Pakistan stakes. Besides external games with its
neighbours, India plays internal games to appease fragments,
which are influenced by foreign stakeholders. Religion
is used as soft power in the game of Islam versus the
West, and India’s fragmentation hastens the harvesting of
souls in the world's largest open market. The multinational
business gameboard spotlights India as a market, a supplier,
a competitor, and an investment destination.
In another gameboard, scholars of South Asia construct
a discourse with Indian intellectuals
as their sepoys and
affiliated NGOs as paid agents.
Following the academic and
human rights experts who
profited from the Iraq invasion,
the players in this game hope that US president
designate Barack Obama will budget billions to “engage
The identity challenges are offset by forces that hold India
together. Private enterprises that span the entire country
bring cohesion that depends on high economic growth and
its trickle down to the lowest strata to outpace population
growth and social unrest. Economic prosperity is also
required for military spending. More than any other institution,
the armed forces unify the nation because they
realise that soldiers must identify themselves with the nation
they are prepared to die for.
Recent US policy supports India’s sovereignty, but
this should be seen in the context of using India as
a counterweight against Pan-Islam and China. In the
long run, the US would like India not to become another
unified superpower like China or to disintegrate into
a Pakistan-like menace. It will “manage” India between
these two extremes. An elephant cannot put itself
up for adoption as someone’s pet. It must learn to
fend for itself.
Lessons for India
Although the US is a land of immigrants, pride of place goes
to the majority religion. Political candidates for high office
are seriously disadvantaged if they are not seen as good
Christians. The church-state separation is not a mandate to
denounce Christianity or privilege minority religions. America
was built on white identity that involved the ethnic
cleansing of others. To its credit, India has avoided this.Obama sought a better, unified nation and transcended
the minorityism of previous Black leaders. Unlike the Dravidianists,
Mayawati, and those Muslim and Christian leaders
who undermine India's identity, Obama is unabashedly
patriotic and a devout follower of its majority religion.
America celebrates its tapestry of hyphenated identities
(Indian-American, Irish-American, etc.) but “American”
supersedes every sub-identity. Being un-American is a death
knell for American leaders.
In sharp contrast, Mayawati, Indian Muslim leaders,
Indian Christian leaders, Dravidianists and other “minority”
vote bankers have consolidated power at the expense of
India's unified identity. Unlike the promoters of fragmented
Indian identities, Obama is closer to Mahatma Gandhi and
Ambedkar, champions of the downtrodden within a unified
India can learn from American mechanisms. Indian
billionaires must become major stakeholders in constructing
positive discourse on the
nation. They must make strategic
commitments like those
made by the Carnegies, Rockefellers
and Fords in building
American identity, its sense of
history, and in projecting American ideals. American meritocracy
in politics, implemented through internal primaries,
is vastly superior to the cronyism in Indian politics.
The area studies programmes in American universities
have close links to the government, think tanks and
churches, and they examine nations and civilisations from
the American perspective. India should establish a network
of area studies to study neighboring countries and other
regions from India’s viewpoint. India should study China’s
establishment of 100 Confucian Studies Chairs worldwide
and the civilisational grand narrative of other nations.
with pre-packaged solutions are obsolete. The Indian genius must improvise,
innovate, and create a national identity worthy of its name.
is the President, Infinity Foundation, who also writes on issues concerning
the place of Indian civilisation in the world